Voice

Omaha is considering building a $700-800 million beltway system that will focus on transportation needs outside of the city, rather than in it. If you stand for a transportation plan that provides for the improvement and maintenance of existing infrastructure, encourages sustainable public transportation options, and benefits Omahans of every demographic sector, click here and sign your name to this VOICE-sponsored petition to make your voice heard. Once you’ve signed the petition, use the forwarding function and send it to everyone you know who stands with you and VOICE on this issue.

The results of the petition will be shared with civic leaders and representatives of the MAPA transportation planning board. Together we can ensure that Omaha is a vibrant community now — and for generations to come.

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The Metropolitan Area Planning Agency (MAPA) is reviewed by the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) and Federal Transit Administration (FTA) every 4 years.  Part of this review process involves a public meeting where the community can voice it’s concerns about MAPA.  The public meeting is next Monday March 15 from 5:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. at the MAPA offices, 2222 Cuming Street.  This is a good chance for YOU to give feedback to MAPA.

While your at it, take a look at the MAPA Beltway Study and give them your feedback on that proposed project as well.

Here is the official notice.

PUBLIC NOTICE
The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) and the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) will be in Omaha March 15 and 16 for a federal certification review of the Metropolitan Area Planning Agency (MAPA), which is the Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO) for the Omaha-Council Bluffs region.  The review will cover MAPA’s transportation planning process and the effectiveness of that process.

A public input meeting has been scheduled for Monday evening, March 15 from 5:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. at the MAPA offices, 2222 Cuming Street in Omaha.

Major elements to be discussed include organization and management of the planning process, planning agreements and the cooperative process, planning factors, public involvement, project selection, and financial constraint. Products of the planning process – The Long Range Plan, TIP, and Unified Work program – will also be discussed.

If you are unable to attend this meeting and would like to comment, please send written comments to Paul Mullen, MAPA Executive Director at:

Metropolitan Area Planning Agency

2222 Cuming Street

Omaha, Nebraska 68102-4328

or e-mail paul_mullen@mapacog.org

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This PBS documentary explores how other cities have dealt with, and continue to deal with, transportation planning and how their choices affect their cities. There is a lot of interesting information about Denver’s beltway and Portland’s mass transit, both of which are very relevant to the conversations happening in Omaha now.

Blueprint America: Road to the Future, an original documentary part of a PBS multi-platform series on the country’s aging and changing infrastructure, goes to three very different American cities — Denver, New York and Portland, and their surrounding suburbs — to look at each as an example of the challenges and possibilities the country faces as citizens, local and federal officials, and planners struggle to manage a growing America with innovative transportation and sustainable land use policies.

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As many of you know, VOICE has been focusing our attention lately on urban design and its affects on social mobility and equal opportunity. Specifically, we have been discussing how the proposed beltway around Omaha will not only impact transportation within our city, but also social mobility and equal opportunities for areas of our community that are already hurting, like North Omaha. This recent article in the Omaha World Herald outlines the complicated issues surrounding this area of our city and, most importantly, how you can get involved to help eliminate the epidemic poverty and violence in our community.

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Design Alliance Omaha is hosting an event featuring Majora Carter on Thursday, February 25 at the Joslyn Art Museum. Ms. Carter was born, raised and continues to live in the South Bronx. Her career has taken her around the world in pursuit of resources and ideas to improve the quality of life in environmentally challenged communities. She founded Sustainable South Bronx in 2001 after writing a $1.25M Federal Transportation grant to design the South Bronx Greenway with 11 miles of bike and pedestrian paths connecting the rivers and neighborhoods to each other, and to the rest of the city. That project secured over $20 million in funds for first phase construction and serves as alternative transportation, an economic development anchor, storm water management infrastructure as well as healthy recreation. Her accomplishments grow from the notion that self-image is influenced by surroundings—so those surroundings should be beautiful! Her vision, drive, and tenacity earned her a MacArthur “Genius” Grant. She started 2007 as one of Newsweek’s “25 To Watch”, ended the year as one of Essence Magazine’s “25 most Influential African Americans”. She has been named one of the “50 most influential women in NYC” by the NY Post for the past two years, and “NYC’s most influential environmentalist” by the BBC World Service.

daOMA Presents: Majora Carter, Environmental Advocate
Thursday, February 25, 2010
7:00 pm
Joslyn Art Museum Witherspoon Concert Hall

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On Friday, February 26, people passionate about impacting our community will gather at Creighton University to learn more about social enterprise. It’s the first event of its kind in the region. Stephen A. Vogel from Grameen America, a microfinance nonprofit organization that provides loans, savings programs, credit establishment and other financial services to entrepreneurs living below the poverty line, will be the keynote speaker. Throughout the day, you will have the opportunity to listen to speakers share personal, proven formulas for improving the lives of others and attend provocative breakout sessions with fellow advocates. For more information or to register online: www.socialimpactomaha.org.

SOCIAL IMPACT FORUM
February 26, 2010
8:00 am – 4:00 pm
Creighton University
Mike & Josie Harper Center for Student Life & Learning

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Urban design and social justice are complex issues that will require a coordinated effort by many to effect change. Below are recommendations from our members who attended the public meeting.

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In addition to some great things we learned from our panelists at the Public Meeting, we learned a great deal about the meeting attendees. Open this PowerPoint presentation to find out who was there and what concerns them most.

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At the VOICE Public Meeting, the panelists provided a rich discussion on a broad range of topics, including historic patterns of development and growth in Omaha, and how our city’s culture and community would be affected should a beltway be built. The panelists all agreed that the link between transportation and social mobility is strong; urban design, they said, has a direct effect on equal opportunity. Citing initial expenses and long-term costs, de-centralization (of jobs, money, population) from the city’s eastern core, continued sprawl, the over-extension of infrastructure, and concerns about how a beltway would negatively affect east Omahans, the panel generally advocated in favor of expanding and improving the public transportation system, rather than committing all of our money and energy to a beltway. By the end of the meeting, the attendees were in agreement with the panelists, moving into a spirited discussion about how VOICE could help educate the public and build momentum around a movement to develop transportation in Omaha, rather than around it.

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One of the many meaningful things that came out of our public meeting discussion was a suggestion by panelist Willie Barney to bring together VOICE with the Empowerment Network, a united group of African-American leaders and neighborhood residents focused on the empowerment of African-Americans, North Omaha, and the entire Greater Omaha Area. The first step in developing such a relationship is for VOICE members to attend the Empowerment Network’s monthly community meeting, which will be held this Saturday, February 13th. Please join us! All are welcome and encouraged to attend.

Empowerment Network Meeting
North High School
4410 N 36th Street
Saturday, February 13
9:00 – 11:30 AM

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